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Dmitri Tcherniakov’s staging of Rusalka in Naples has a starkly modern visual style which occasionally dilutes the story’s emotional impact.

Shawna Lucey directs verismo's inseparable twins in the Lyric Opera of Kansas City's outstanding season opener. 

Christof Loy's production of Tosca at ENO replaces Catherine Malfitano’s and, despite being visually attractive, suffers certain muddled ideas. It boasts, however, a strong trio of singers who deliver a committed performance on the production's first night at the Coliseum. 

Mark Elder brought the Hallé down to the Royal Albert Hall for an interesting programme of Dukas, Respighi and Puccini.

A vast panopticon cages strong musical performances in Wake-Walker's Fidelio at Glyndebourne, with Dorothea Herbert and Adam Smith standing out vocally and emotionally as Leonore and Florestan.

More relevant than ever, the patriarchal nightmare of Verdi's Rigoletto is dark and unflinching in Scottish Opera's revival of their 2011 production, with some striking scenes and fine singing.

It's not easy to imagine a freezing Parisian attic when you're in the middle of the rolling Dorset countryside in a baking summer, but Dorset Opera's excellent production of Puccini's La bohème is atmospheric enough to do so.

Rimsky-Korsakov’s opera is rarely performed outside Russia. Sadly, I doubt that Daniel Kramer’s staging for Opera Vlaanderen will win it many new friends.

The unclear ideas and the excessive blackness in Thalheimer’s concept failed to convince, but Stoyanov and Joel’s presentation of Verdi’s score made up for those problems.

The lack of shock value in Calixto Bieito’s interpretation of Wagner's Tannhäuser premiering at the Vlaamse Opera in Ghent could almost be seen as a disappointment. All the more surprising then was the romantic intimacy created in this superlatively sung production.

I’m sure before long I’ll see a production of Daisy Pulls It Off that opens with modern day soldiers charging onto the stage waving rifles about – it seems to be the first image directors reach for these days.

UCOpera, the opera company of University College London, has a history of putting on lesser known Verdi works: amongst many others, they have staged the British premières of Alzira, Oberto and the original 1847 version of Macbeth.

Despite a relatively easy-to-follow storyline, Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro is an opera that is hard to pull off entirely successfully. Musically, it requires enormous vigour from both cast and orchestra; dramatically, this opera buffa demands strong acting skills in order to eke out its moments of farce.